Attorney General Rayfield Backs Challenge to Unlawful Warrantless Immigration Arrests

Attorney General Dan Rayfield filed a brief in federal court this week supporting a lawsuit that challenges the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) practice of making warrantless civil immigration arrests that break federal law. The filing comes as neighbors, coworkers, and parents have been disappearing from communities across Oregon and the country, swept up in arrests made without a warrant and without the basic check the law requires: whether the person is actually a flight risk.

"The law sets a basic standard - if you're going to arrest someone without a warrant, you need a real reason to do so," said Attorney General Rayfield. "DHS is ignoring that standard, and Oregonians are paying the price. We've seen kids stay home from school, farm workers afraid to show up for work, and families skipping medical appointments because they don't know who might be waiting for them. Our communities are less healthy and less safe because of DHS' actions."

Under federal law, immigration officers can only make a warrantless civil arrest if they have probable cause to believe a person is in the country unlawfully and is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained. DHS officers have routinely skipped that second requirement. The brief lays out the real damage these practices are doing in communities across the country, including in Oregon.

Over the past year, federal immigration agents have ramped up enforcement nationwide, and the ripple effects have reached public health, public safety, schools, and local economies. Aggressive tactics have kept students out of classrooms, disrupted agricultural work, discouraged people from seeking medical care, strained family finances, and eroded the trust between immigrant communities and local police. And when agents show up in ski masks, dark sunglasses, plain clothes, and unmarked cars, and won't say who they are, it only deepens the fear and confusion neighbors are feeling.

The brief was filed in Escobar-Molina v. DHS, a case challenging DHS's policy and practice of warrantless civil immigration arrests in the District of Columbia. On December 2, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia partially granted a motion for a preliminary injunction.

Attorney General Rayfield filed the brief alongside the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington.